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Brent Council, in partnership with Transport for London (TfL), appointed a project team to develop a concept design looking at ways of improving public realm features and accessibility for pedestrians and cyclists in the Chamberlayne Road area.

The Chamberlayne Road public realm study includes the length of Chamberlayne Road / Kilburn Lane from Whitmore Gardens to Harrow Road and including Station Terrace. Output from the study will form the basis of a bid for future funding from TfL’s Local Implementation Plan (LIP) or Major Scheme programmes. This funding is essential for the civil engineering works associated with a proposed programme. A copy of the report and appendices is available below.

Councillor Eleanor Southwood, Queens Park Ward and Lead Member for Environment said.

“This report is an important landmark in our work to improve Chamberlayne Road. 4 local residents associations, local councillors, council officers and our consultants, Urban Flow, have developed an exciting vision for the future of the area.

The focus has been on reducing congestion, improving air quality and making Chamberlayne Road a pleasant, safe place to enjoy. The next stage is to identify potential funding sources so that we can start to make our vision into reality.

Despite growing demand for local services from an increasing and ageing population, the funding that Brent Council receives from the Government is set to fall even further. Come along and have your say on Brent’s tax and spending proposals for 2017/18.

In addition, we will have the latest policing update for Brondesbury Park, Kilburn, Mapesbury and Queens Park wards, and the rest of Brent. Can you help improve the service the police offer Brent communities?

Six years of cuts by central government to local authority budgets across the UK has meant Brent Council has needed to find new ways to maintain services, with some difficult decisions made along the way.

Despite growing demand for local services from an increasing and ageing population, the funding that Brent Council receives from the Government is set to fall even further.

Rather than cut vital services, which residents rely on, the council is consulting on its budget including a proposal to raise council tax by 3.99 percent to help plug the gap left by the government’s cuts.

As well as showing how the council plans to raise income to balance the books the budget details spending plans for 2017/18.

Key areas include everything from investment in making Brent cleaner and safer, rubbish and recycling collection, boosting jobs and skills to protecting the vulnerable, increasing council housing, maintaining parks and open spaces and giving every child the best start in life.

Aaron is a national campaigner at Friends of the Earth, the environment charity.

He currently coordinates Friends of the Earth’s air pollution work. Previous to this he was a lead organiser of the largest climate demonstration in Britain last November and campaigned against fracking in the north-west.

He has expertise in equalities, higher and further education. Prior to working for Friends of the Earth, he was the Black Students’ Officer at the National Union of Students.

Oliver Lord

Oliver is Deputy Air Quality Manager at the Greater London Authority. He leads on a number of the Mayor’s initiatives to cut transport emissions in the Capital, including electric vehicle infrastructure, taxi licensing and road user charging schemes.

Before this he worked at Transport for London, where he delivered several projects and initiatives to encourage sustainable travel. Most recently, he was responsible for developing transport strategy and policy, with a particular focus on the environment, including the Ultra -Low Emission Zone. He previously specialised in Environmental Psychology at the University of Surrey.

Jennifer Barrett

Jennifer is currently managing teams responsible for Environmental Protection, namely nuisance control, contaminated land and air quality. This includes ensuring the council is compliant with current legislation and controlling activities which could be harmful to residents and/or the environment.

Jennifer is lead officer for the provision of the council’s Air Quality Action Plan.

Tony Kennedy

Tony is Brent’s Head of Highways and Infrastructure. He is responsible for the planning, design, consultation and construction/maintenance of the boroughs Highways and Infrastructure. This includes optimisation of modal transport share, improving road safety and minimising congestion, managing the highway network on a daily basis and maintaining the highway infrastructure through planned and reactive maintenance programmes.

(Brent Council) In April 2016 the Yusuf Islam Foundation (the Trust) informed the governors of Islamia Voluntary Aided 2FE Primary school and the Council that they do not see the development of the planned new build school on the Salusbury Road site as consistent with their ambition to develop the Trust’s independent secondary schools. The market rent which the Foundation was seeking from its Islamia Primary School as recompense for providing the additional land would have been unaffordable for Islamia Primary School and would have quickly led the school into financial difficulty.

· The Trustees also informed the board of governors and the Council that they remained committed to honouring an original agreement which allows for a 1FE maintained Voluntary Aided primary school to operate on its Salusbury Road site.

· Governors sought advice from the Council on the timetable and process for a reduction to 1FE. They were advised that consultation will need to take place in the Autumn Term 2016 for a reduction to 1FE to take effect from September 2018. The Council has not received any confirmation from the school or the Trust that they intend to consult on a reduction to 1FE next term. The decision to reduce to 1FE would be made by the board of governors not the Council.

· There has been no formal request for the Council to secure alternative premises for this voluntary aided school. There are currently no suitable sites available

· Officers have informed the Trust that these actions give us cause for concern and that we will be seeking legal advice. We have done so and have also asked the Trust to provide the requisite legal documentation in relation to their oversight of Islamia Voluntary Aided Primary School. To date this has not been forthcoming. We will now be seeking to meet with the Chair of the Trust and the Chair of the Governing Body. We will update members following these meetings.

· The current use of Winkworth Hall by Islamia Primary School to accommodate 2FE will therefore need to continue beyond 2018.

Changes to the way on-street parking permits in Controlled Parking Zones are managed in Brent have been agreed by Cabinet.

In April and May of this year, a major public consultation took place to seek the views of Brent residents on suggested reforms to on-street parking around the borough.

These changes will help manage the high demand for on-street parking, reduce traffic congestion and improve road safety, provide convenient and affordable parking for visitors and businesses, and enable more residents to park near their homes.

Having taken on board feedback from well over 3,000 residents, the proposals put to the council’s Cabinet included recommendations to freeze Pay & Display charges borough-wide, safeguard the popular Visitor Household permit to assist residents requiring care and support, and introduce a new daily permit for local businesses – allowing them to park anywhere in Brent whilst making deliveries or carrying out building work.

Plans to support school parking have also been agreed, aiming to assist local schools to recruit and retain key staff.

In order to give owners of diesel vehicles enough time to respond to recent revelations about increased pollution risk, Cabinet agreed to delay introduction of a pollution surcharge for diesel car permits until October 2018.

Other agreed changes include plans to simplify the resident parking permit scheme to provide a clearer incentive to switch to lower-emission vehicles, and to increase visitor charges for stays of longer than 2 hours, in order to contain the very high demand for parking spaces across the borough.

Councillor Eleanor Southwood, Cabinet Member for Environment, said:

“I’m really grateful to everyone who took part in this consultation, which is the first time we’ve looked at parking permit arrangements in a comprehensive way. Residents made it clear that they want to see the council better manage our limited parking spaces. Whilst I understand that increasing charges is never popular, I believe that these changes give us a real opportunity to tackle the huge demand for parking across the borough.”

“These changes also make clear our commitment to work closely with residents, businesses and schools to encourage more sustainable transport wherever possible, keep traffic moving and take steps to improve air quality and reduce our carbon footprint.

“We’re committed to making Brent a borough that is accessible for everyone and this includes ensuring that residents and their visitors can find a parking space when they need one.”

We’re all still coming to terms with the tragic death of Jo Cox this week. I’ve been lucky enough to have met Jo and her husband and my thoughts are with him and their children at this awful time. I think Jonathan Freedland said it well when he wrote that “if you inject enough poison into the political bloodstream, eventually somebody will get sick”.

In my six years of experience as a local Councillor I’ve seen members from all parties work hard to represent and improve their communities. Yet I’ve also seen terrible abuse at public meetings or on social media. Increasingly you feel that ‘politics’ is a negative term and something to be avoided when in fact our democratic ‘political’ system allows us to freely debate and discuss the organisation of life in this country through legitimate elected representatives that we can replace.

Politicians may not always get it right and are as guilty as anyone to human fallibilities but to have them inaccessible and hidden due to security demands will be further tragedy. Meanwhile we should all look to continue Jo’s legacy and in particular her campaign for Britain to accept more unaccompanied child refugees

During the Balkans conflict of 1992-1995, the Bosnian town of Srebrenica was declared a UN Safe Area in 1993, under the watch of the United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR).

In July 1995, General Ratko Mladić and his Serbian paramilitary units overran and captured the town, despite its designation as an area “free from any armed attack or any other hostile act”.

In the days following Srebrenica’s fall, more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were systematically massacred and buried in mass graves. Thousands of women, children and elderly people were forcibly deported and a large number of women were raped. It was the greatest atrocity on European soil since the Second World War.

This July we will be marking this day, remembering what happened and ensuring that the lessons and rejection of hatred is something we take with us into the future.

Please join us at the Brent Civic Centre to hear from survivors of the Genocide.